MONTOUR — For as long as anyone could remember, the late Glen Rubenbauer always dreamed of opening up a steakhouse.

“Rube,” as he was affectionately known, and his namesake restaurant still live on in Montour a half century after it launched, and, as evidenced by the myriad press clippings that now grace the walls, it’s become one of the most iconic eateries in all of Iowa both for its high-quality and massive cuts of meat and, of course, the unique “grill your own” setup that’s still famous to this day.

Throughout its history, Rube’s has also enjoyed remarkable consistency in its operations with just two owners — Rubenbauer up until his retirement in 1993, and the Anderson family ever since.

‘He just kind of winged it’

Lisa Rubenbauer, Glen’s daughter and an alum of Marshalltown High School, recalls conversations with her father when he was farming and raising livestock in the area about his grander entrepreneurial ambition, and in 1973, he heard of a steakhouse in Des Moines utilizing the grill your own concept and decided he might want to try it for himself in the tiny community of Montour just off of Highway 30 in southwestern Tama County.

When Rube’s launched, Lisa was 18, and while she hoped it would work out well for her father, she had no idea just how much success he would enjoy.

“He dabbled in a number of things, but Rube’s was the one that really succeeded well for him,” she said.

The Albion High School graduate had changed courses a few times, first farming and then operating a resort in northern Minnesota in the 1960s, before returning to his home area and deciding to give it an honest go in the restaurant business.

“It was always his dream, and he was really excited to get it going. I didn’t have any idea that it would get to the popularity stage that he had gotten. I don’t think he even did at that point,” she said. “It started with a tavern, and then he always had this dream of opening up a steakhouse, and also, he was a carpenter by trade and he did a lot of that construction himself initially.”

She joked that he never drew up any sort of a detailed business plan but opted instead to ‘wing it’ and hope for the best. In the early days, it was a fairly simple tavern inside of a single building, but anyone who’s visited recently knows that between the massive restaurant and the patio, Rube’s now takes up almost half of a city block.

Not long after he bought the bar, patrons began to ask for food options, and instead of installing a traditional kitchen, he borrowed the idea that made him famous. His philosophy was simple: large, high quality cuts of meat with a baked potato, a bare bones salad bar and plenty of alcohol. There were only five options on the original menu — a 28 oz. sirloin, a 32 oz. ham steak, a 26 oz. T-Bone, a 20 oz. no bone ribeye and a 16 oz. filet — and it’s an ethos the Andersons have carried forward to this day, albeit with a few modifications. A pork option was added at some point, though no one is exactly sure when.

“He’s always been all about corn fed beef. He really thought that with the marbling and the meat, that corn fed beef was the way to go, and Angus, he liked Angus beef,” Lisa said. “I think he sourced it all locally because he wanted to support the farmers around that area because he started out as a farmer raising his own beef in Le Grand.”

While the payoff may not have been immediate, by the late 1970s, Rube’s had evolved into something of a phenomenon: both Lisa Rubenbauer and Matt Anderson, the current co-owner along with his wife Michele, can remember waiting times of up to two hours. The patrons didn’t care, though, as long as they got their steaks.

“It was always a wait out on the street, out on the sidewalk to get in,” Matt Anderson said. “Times have changed, but it was more of that supper club vibe where that was kind of part of your evening to sit and have a cocktail or two and just make that part of your night. That wait was just part of it.”

The time period was also difficult for Rube on a personal level, however, as he lost his son David to cancer in 1979 at the age of 26.

“It took a pretty big toll on him when Dave died,” Lisa said.

Lisa, who now resides in Prescott, Ariz., spent her professional career in the nursing field and moved far away from her small town roots, but she always took pride in what her father created. She doesn’t get back too often anymore, but when Glen passed away in 2017, the remaining family members and friends headed there for a meal afterward and filled up while he was presumably watching over them with a smile on his face.

When asked if she’d be making a stop at Rube’s the next time she returns, Lisa didn’t hesitate.

“You know it,” she said.

Passing the torch

By the early 1990s, Rube was staring down retirement and ready to hand off the now famous business he had started to someone new. As it turned out, a longtime family friend was waiting in the wings.

Gary Anderson, a lawyer in the Tama-Toledo area, had known him for years and worked with Glen on the legal side of the business, so he jumped at the chance to purchase Rube’s as part of a group that included Gary’s sons Matt and Jeff. Today, Matt and Michele are the only remaining co-owners.

Unsurprisingly, Michele still has a vivid recollection of the first time Matt brought her to the restaurant on a date when they were college students.

“When we were dating in college, he brought me here to this restaurant, this grill your own steakhouse, and it sounded like the wackiest thing in the world. Like, why would you go to a restaurant where you have to cook your own food? So we get in here, and I’m little, 5’2″, wall to wall people and I’m like ‘What’s happening here?’ And we finally get to our table 2 ½ hours later and I’m not a big bread eater, but I ate like a whole loaf of bread,” she said. “I ate an entire one of those big filets you can get. I thought it was the best thing in the world.”

Much like the founder, the Andersons took somewhat of a unique journey to owning and operating the steakhouse and eventually expanding it to a second location in Waukee, which opened in 1999. Matt graduated from STC High School — although, as he noted, he had no intention of returning when he left for college — so he always had fond memories of the place, but Michele was born and raised in the Cedar Rapids area and wasn’t entirely convinced she wanted to move out to a small town after the couple graduated from the University of Iowa.

“I’d been in a sales position. I was selling college textbooks. This was not on my radar at all. My dad called and said ‘Hey, guess what? We bought Rube’s.’ And I’m like ‘What? You bought Rube’s. Wow. How are you gonna do that?'” Matt said. “He had a manager at the time, and that didn’t last for too long. And that’s when Michele and I got the call to see if I was interested in coming down and operating it.”

Michele was traveling across the state designing and selling cheerleading and dance uniforms for a national company, but she had a restaurant background and eventually jumped onboard with some light coaxing.

“We were so young and newlywed, and we got married in ’93. We were in our mid 20s. I could live about anywhere and continue to work with what I was doing,” she said. “I’m like ‘Alright, well here’s an adventure,’ and I had worked in restaurants since I was 14 or 15, working at a Tastee Freez and a bunch of different restaurants, and I liked it. And I had an interest in restaurants when I was younger and thought that might be a direction to go, so I thought ‘Well this’ll be kind of cool.’ So we moved to Montour, Iowa. He didn’t have to convince me too hard except (that) we had just put an offer in on a house in Cedar Rapids. So we had to rescind that offer, and anyway, we dropped everything and moved here.”

Three decades later, they still feel it was the right decision — most days, at least. Naturally, the Andersons have made changes and beefed up the menu with a host of sides and desserts including the beloved skillet potatoes, but they’ve always tried to stay true to the original spirit. And like Rube, they’re still willing to ship their meat and spices across the country to anyone who wants them.

Leaving a legacy

Although Rube’s now has a presence in the Des Moines area with the Waukee location, its roots — and its soul — will always remain at the big building in Montour encompassing a space that once held five separate establishments. The Andersons have raised their family in Toledo, and even though neither of their children has much interest in taking it over when they retire, they’re confident they’ll find the right people to pass it on to when the time comes.

“A big part of this brand is because it is a destination, and being in a city never really ever crossed my mind. Even though we’re in Waukee, 20 years ago, it was a gravel road,” Matt said. “This place has drawn people from all over the world.”

The Andersons have been celebrating the 50-year anniversary with a host of specials throughout October including a two for $50 prime top sirloin special and deals on champagne, wine, the first ever side dish (the mushroom skillet), the brownie delight dessert, throwback cocktails and a table recreating what it would have looked like to sit down and eat all the way back in 1973. While the future is never certain, they’re confident that they’re in a position to continue to succeed going forward.

“I think it’s super important just to maintain what we do and what we do well… We’ve stayed firm to the whole grill your own aspect, and we’re finding that people want that getaway,” Michele said. “For a while, it’s been (that) you just go out to eat and it’s what you do before you go do something else or you just need food. People aren’t cooking as much, but coming here is just such a special occasion. It’s different. It’s an experience, so maintaining that so there is a legacy to leave to whoever comes next after us, these are conversations that we need to have with each other because we are middle aged now. So we’re not the 25-year-olds that we were when we came in.”

Over the years, the staff have become a second family for Matt and Michele, and they’d love to someday pass the business on to someone within that group. After navigating the chaos of the COVID-19 pandemic, which wreaked havoc on the restaurant industry and caused thousands of them to close across the country, they feel blessed to continue to carry on the Rube’s name.

“We’re honored. It’s a real special opportunity, a special place, obviously. Michele talked about leaving that legacy, and we got awfully frightened during that pandemic because all of our industry brothers and sisters are shutting down and losing everything,” Matt said. “It’s just important to us, like Michele said, when our time comes and however we hit this transition, we left it behind as good or better than when Rube had it. But when he had it, I mean, what a heyday — just such unique periods of time and differences between the ’70s and ’80s and the 2020s.”

Fifty years later, Rube’s still has the same allure that has made it such a popular destination in the first place, and it provides an experience that’s difficult to replicate anywhere else. A few sage words of advice for those who plan to visit for the first time: don’t burn the Texas toast, and always order dessert.

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Contact Robert Maharry at 641-753-6611 ext. 255 or rmaharry@timesrepublican.com.